So, I’ve gotten over thirty new Tumblr followers this week. I’m not sure why, but I’ll go with it and do the proper thing—

Welcome! Here is a little bit about me and my blog.

I am 24, from Kansas. I am a second-year teacher in the worst school in San Francisco that will be closing at the end of the year. I teach a middle school self-contained Special Ed. class—the same kids two years in a row. I am in Teach for America and will be moving to Brooklyn to teach at Achievement First charter school after this year. I wasn’t going to teach after my two or three years in TFA, but after what I’ve seen, I am incensed about the state of our public schools for poor kids, minority kids, and Special Ed. kids, and I want to sink an indefinite chunk of my life in it. 

Opinionated Side Notes—

  • In spite of being in TFA and working at a TFA-spawn next year, I’m not sold on their model as the model of success. I currently teach a population that I personally believe they can’t and won’t reach, but I always have to credit them for getting me involved in the first place. And I will have to credit Achievement First for giving me the intense, quality professional development and accountability that public schools won’t give me—I need to know, at least for a little while, what it means to teach and teach well for a sustained period of time in a functional environment.
  • There are some sucky teachers, but all the teacher-hating that TFA seems to evoke (I don’t think it says it, but I think people misinterpret it) isn’t the solution. From what I’ve seen, you could have an A+ staff, and it will be absolutely ruined by administration every time—principal and up. Therefore, I am distantly interested in school leadership and policy.
  • I don’t mind if you TFA-bash. I will probably respond, because I think I have a unique perspective, and I assume you are an open minded individual who wants to know all view points. If you aren’t, tell me to shove it. If you are, let’s have a conversation! Teaching-through-TFA is the only thing I know, and I would love to hear perspectives of more traditional educators.

Anyway, my blog is called Grit In The Gap, because I find that I have a lot more, healthy relationships when I save for my blog the nitty, gritty details of teaching within the worst part of the achievement gap—rather than the dinner table or the bar.

I’ve kept this blog since Day One, so if you’re interested in ev-er-y detail of my first year of teaching, check out my #teaching tag and just go back, back, back. This year, as things in my classroom became more and more routine, I had to make an effort to keep track of my experiences, so most days, I try to run themes.

  • Moment Mondays are for reflecting on the sweet, harrowing, funny, and/or movie moments that occur when you teach any kids but especially Speech-Language Impaired tweens. All day. For two years in a row.
  • Toilet Tuesdays are collections of the negative. My first year was really rough, and because of how the schedule worked out, I was in the same room with eleven tweens six hours in a row everyday. Sometimes my only refuge was going to the bathroom during passing periods, sitting on the toilet, and texting or Facebooking my friends. haha that is so sad when I type it all out. Life is much better now, but there are still things that drive me to the proverbial toilet.
  • Thankful Thursdays are for finding something to be thankful about in my job.
  • Fun Fridays are for those times when teaching is just fun, whether because we do something fun or, for once in the midst of the chaos of their home lives and school lives, the stars align, and they grasp concepts.
  • On saturdays and Sundays, I try to lay in bed and read the news, commentary, other Education Tumblrs, etc.

And that is that. Things will be looking differently soon, as summer is approaching, and as a major shift in my environment, expectations, and support will occur in the Fall. I have a feeling it won’t be so gritty, but I might be able to contribute to the Education tag in legit, curriculum and pedagogical ways and not kids-in-my-school-have-formed-milk-gangs-and-my-students-got-hit-and-were-too-bruised-to-learn-today ways.

Now tell me, is there anything else you’d like to know?